


i thought it was then (but it wasn't, it wasn't genuine)

by zeitgeistofnow



Category: SK8 the Infinity (Anime)
Genre: Coda, Established Relationship, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, but also like angry and stuff, let them be soft okay 🥺
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-09
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-15 13:00:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,692
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29933790
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zeitgeistofnow/pseuds/zeitgeistofnow
Summary: “i never loved him,” cherry says suddenly.joe reaches forward to pause the shitty american financial drama they’re watching.
Relationships: Nanjo Kojiro | Joe/Sakurayashiki Kaoru | Cherry Blossom
Comments: 4
Kudos: 227





	i thought it was then (but it wasn't, it wasn't genuine)

**Author's Note:**

> title from fetch the bolt cutters by fiona apple, which really reminds me of these three. like _and you maim when you're on offense / but you kill when you're on defense_. yeah

“I never loved him,” Cherry says suddenly.

Joe reaches forward to pause the shitty American financial drama they’re watching. The white guy on screen is paused mid-impassioned speech, the subtitles at the bottom of the screen saying something about a man Joe has never heard of and whatever the fuck a trust-buster is. 

It wasn’t a show that Joe wanted to watch in the first place, but at some point over the last decade they became the kind of couple who takes turns choosing TV shows to watch together, so here he is.

Joe holds Cherry slightly tighter- when they were younger this would be the point in their emotional conversations where Joe would wrap Cherry in the tightest bear hug he could manage and let the other man talk into his shoulder, but the doctors say that Cherry’s condition will be fragile for months and it’s only been a few weeks. 

“It was a stupid infatuation- no one falls in  _ love  _ when they’re teenagers,” Cherry sneers, “and love has always been about choices for me, you know, and I never chose him when it got harder.”

Joe remembers talking about this in their early twenties, after Cherry picked Joe up from work and pushed him against a wall and murmured  _ I always choose you when I don’t know where to go _ until Joe kissed him. They talked about it more years later, sleepy and introspective on a balcony somewhere far from home, and Cherry told Joe that he realized he loved him on an evening when he had to decide between skating with a brief paramour and drinking at Sialaluce and never even considered the former option.

“You didn’t owe him anything,” Joe says. Cherry lifts an arm to lightly hit Joe’s chest.

“I know that, idiot.” Still, he looks distant. Joe supposes he understands. He went through this earlier than Cherry did- once when Adam left for America in their teens and he spent a month and a half punching his feelings out and giving Cherry a wide berth, once when Adam started dropping into S again and Joe had to digest exactly why he was back. 

He’d half-assumed Cherry had just gotten over it faster than he did, some kind of split-second analysis of the situation with Langa that left him with the conclusion that it wasn’t worth getting anything but angry about. Joe should have figured that wasn’t the case: he’s always known Cherry was the optimist between them, always the one to suggest giving their friend one more chance, always the one to insist that any given situation wasn’t worth the worry Joe put into it.

Joe loves that about him, yeah, but right now he wishes that Cherry had been a little more pessimistic. Or he doesn’t. He doesn’t know.

He wishes Adam had been a little better.

“I didn’t love him,” Cherry repeats, “but-”

“We did,” Joe says, “it’s alright. You’re alright.”

Cherry looks up at him, pink hair loose around his shoulders and falling over shining eyes. Joe offers him a small smile- the moment feels like it needs a grin, a joke and for one of them to turn the show back on and continue like nothing is wrong, but Joe can’t quite manage it. When Cherry buries his face in Joe’s t-shirt he can feel the coolness of the other man’s tears through it and he tangles his fingers through Cherry’s hair and breaths.

“I apologize for crying onto you,” Cherry says into Joe’s chest, voice muffled.

Joe manages a laugh. “I think I’m getting tears in your hair, so we’re equal.”

“Bastard. Salt is awful for hair, I’m going to get split ends.”

Joe wants to wipe his eyes but not enough to move his hands. “Is this why you never swim at the beach?”

Cherry sniffles and the tail end of an aborted sob turns into a chuckle. “Maybe.”

There’s a beat, both of them crying into each other. It’s been a while since Joe cried, much longer since he cried where anyone could see him, and it feels nice. It hurts, because crying always does, but it feels nice.

“He was our best friend,” Cherry says finally, “it shouldn’t feel as stupid as it does to miss him. I thought we could have him back. I knew he was different, but I knew he was suffering, and that made me think- I thought we could have him  _ back.  _ He said we were special.” Joe can feel the reverberations of Cherry’s words rumble against his chest. 

The thoughts are a little disjointed, every single one obviously an entire thought process boiled down into a sentence. Joe wonders how long he’s been thinking about this- Joe has certainly been using the time they’ve been watching this show to ruminate on their old friend. He wonders if either of them are actually paying attention to the stock traders onscreen.

He doesn’t say anything for a moment and Cherry lets him, taking slow, shallow breaths and waiting. “I miss him too,” he says, “but I never deluded myself into thinking we could have him back, not on our own. He threw us out, Kaoru.”

“We left him!”

“It’s not our fault,” Joe says, swallowing the lump in his throat and winding cherry blossom-pink hair around his fingers. “We all made our choices.”

“We could have chosen him,” Cherry says softly, shifting so that he’s sitting fully on Joe’s lap, an obvious request to be held. Joe pulls him a little tighter and Cherry lets out a shaky breath. “Maybe if I loved him better-”

A stupid chill runs through Joe’s ribs at that and his fingers tighten in Cherry’s hair.

“Stop,” Joe says. He knows that’s not the right thing to say- this is a rare Cherry, quiet and vulnerable, and years of friendship has taught him that any suggestion of hostility against anything at all will make all his walls come back up. Joe isn’t perfect, though, and he’s only gotten more protective since Adam. “Where would you be then? Dead on the side of the skate park? Caught up in whatever perjury shit I see on the news? His  _ Eve?  _ I miss him too, Kaoru, you know I do, and I wish like hell we could have stayed together but leaving him behind was the best thing we ever did.”

Cherry pushes away from Joe’s chest and looks up at him, eyes already narrowed. It makes Joe want to lash back out at him- he hates when Cherry does this, takes everything and anything as an excuse to get defensive. He doesn’t snap, though, and he can see Cherry make the same choice, letting out a deep breath and softening his face before he speaks. “Maybe he wouldn’t have-”

“You know that’s not true,” Joe says. “We were there for the beginning of it. There was a reason we split ways and it wasn’t because of  _ us.” _

Cherry sighs. “Yeah, it wasn’t.” A moment, and then Cherry laughs wetly, the same disbelieving way he laughs when Joe messes up a skating trick they’ve both had a handle on for decades. “I hate him,” he says, “that fucking bastard. Leaving us crying in the middle of this shit TV show while he does whatever the hell he wants in his mansion. I never loved him, and now I hate him, and he deserves it now.” It’s a declaration, even though Cherry’s voice is still shaking from their earlier tears.

Joe smiles and nestles his face into the crook of Cherry’s neck. Cherry doesn’t even protest to the fact that Joe is rather obviously drying his eyes on the collar of his probably absurdly expensive kimono, just reaches up to run long fingers through his curls. 

“I hate him too,” Joe says against Cherry’s collarbone, “for doing that to you and Langa and Miya. I think- I think if someone had given me a gun that night, I would be in prison right now.” It’s a thought he’s been trying not to have. He and Cherry did love Adam for years, even if they didn’t at the same time- he was one of  _ them,  _ and they were special- and the way his name fills Joe with nothing but blinding rage now feels like some kind of betrayal. Not one that Joe regrets, though.

Cherry doesn’t even flinch at the admission. “He’s such a condescending prick,” Cherry says.

“He committed aggravated assault,” Joe says, “what a pompous douchebag.”

Cherry snickers and lightly tousles Joe’s hair. “I love you, Kojiro,” he says.

Joe lifts his head to press a kiss to Cherry’s cheek, right below his eye where he still tastes like saltwater. “I love you too,” he mumbles. “Idiot.”

“Tch, like you’re one to talk.” Cherry shifts to face the TV again, settling against Joe and tangling their legs together. “Press play, oaf,” he says, and Joe wonders distantly why he chose to be in love with a man who uses insults as terms of endearment. Probably because he loves him- probably because he can tell those insults are the pet names Cherry intends them as. The thought makes him smile in a way he’s sure Adam would find disgusting, soft and content.

He doesn’t resume the show, since he’s not sure where the remote went, and Cherry makes an irritated noise. “Carla, press play.” Cherry twists to look up at Joe, exasperation clear on his face. “Honestly, Kojiro, can’t you-” Their eyes meet and any irritation melts off Cherry’s face, replaced almost immediately with almost startled adoration.

If Joe was a lesser man or even if he just spent less time around Cherry, he’s pretty sure he would be literally blown away. As is, he just grins back and brushes some of the hair out of Cherry’s face. “Cat got your tongue, baby?”

“Shut the fuck up,” Cherry mutters, covering his face with one elegant hand and turning back around. “You look radiant,” he says quietly, then, louder: “I’m glad we chose each other, all those years ago.”

“I love you too,” Joe says again, since he knows it means the same thing.

**Author's Note:**

> \- this fic was mostly just written to get all my thoughts about the relationship between these three on paper- i mostly did that, i think. i don't think that cherry was ever in love with adam, (at least not more than joe was/more than you're in love with all the friends you have that kind of 'you two are special' relationship with) and i really don't think he was still in love with adam by the time of the beef because like. he was angry. they both were. also ngl i don't think it's realistic that a teenage crush would last that long, especially when he's clearly aware of how awful adam is  
> \- also tying into my brief foyer into how cherry views love- i think it's a pretty good balance of his pragmatism & optimism! he doesn't believe in love at first sight or soulmates but he does believe in love as a verb. he loves joe because he actively makes loving choices (even if those choices r often being a bitch) not because they're soulmates or whatever.  
> \- established relationship matchablossom.. 🥰🥺 not rly supported by canon but supported by my heart  
> \- please comment/kudos if you enjoyed this!! you can also find me [@lazypigeon](https://lazypigeon.tumblr.com/) on tumblr :)


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